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SELF-GOVERNMENT IN LOUISIANA. 



SPEECH 



HOE F. T. FB 



OF SEW JEESEY, 



SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES, 



1/ 









January 15, 1875, 






WASHINGTON: 

GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE. 

1875. 



rsrr 
.r 






SPEECH 

OF 

HON. F. T. FRELINGHUYSEX. 



The Senate having under consideration the resolution submitted by Mr. Schurz 
on the 8th of January, directing the Committee on the Judiciary to inquire what 
legislation is necessary to secure to the people of the State of Louisiana their rights 
of self-government under the Constitution — 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN said : 

Mr. President: I feel constrained to make a few calm remarks in 
this debate for the purpose of correctinga delusive impression which I 
fear is being made upon the people of the South, and for the purpose 
of counteracting, to the extent of my feeble ability, an injury which 
I believe is being done by positions here taken to the best interests 
of the country. 

The allegation is made openly and repeatedly in the Congress of the 
nation, in the assemblies of the people, and in the public journals, 
that there has been inaugurated, lias long continued, and now exists a 
system of outrage, murder, and assassination at the South, the delib- 
erate design and purpose of which is to deprive American citizens of 
their constitutional rights. It is not for me to say that this allega- 
tion is true ; that would be but the opinion of an individual; but I 
will very briefly call attention to some of the considerations which 
seem to prove the charge. 

While it is true that "common rumor," to use a rough maxim, "is 
a common liar," yet the calm and deliberate conclusions of an 
impartial community, gathering their information from a hundred 
different sources, are entitled to much of the consideration that 
belongs to truth; and I feel that I may say that a large part of the 
community at the North believe that allegation to be true, and that 
the plain people of the country, who love their country better than 
any party, have painful apprehensions that it is true. 

The fact that a large number of those 'against whom this system of 
terrorism is alleged to be directed omit to exercise the cherished right 
of voting, are discontented and seeking to remove from their homes, 
is further evidence of the truth of the charge. 

The fact that some of the white people of the South who recently 
manifested their dissatisfaction with this Government by open revolt 
have since the close of the war displayed their hostility toward 
those who favored ami sustained the Government by the organiza- 
tion of a secrel order known as the Ku-Klux, who are proven by 
thirteen volumes of testimony to have been guilty of the most dia- 
bolical crimes, and that now another order is founded on the antago- 
nism of race, as the name of "White League" alone sufficiently 
shows, is some evidence that the charge is true. We have the evi- 
dence of there having been several slaughters at the South, resulting 
in death to many of those toward whom this terrorism is directed, 



as that at Red River, that at New Orleans, that at Vicksburgk, and at 
in her localities. 

Then, tun, we have the testimony of living witnesses officially be- 
fore this tribunal, under the sanction of oath averring before us that 
the charge is true. The Senator from Louisiana [Mr. West] reluc- 
tantly and under a sense of painful duty, told us the charge was 
true. The Senator from Texas, [Mr. Flanagan,] who has lived nearly 
seventy years with the people of the South, who has no ends to 
answer excepting fidelity to the country, tells us that the one-half 
has not been told. His colleague from the same State [Mr. Hamil- 
ton"] does not contradict him. The Senators from Arkansas and 
from Mississippi are here, and they have not yet risen to say that the 
allegation is false. 

Then, sir, we have the testimony of General Sheridan, that brave 
and patriotic man, the hero of many a battle-field, whose name and 
memory will lie cherished by the American people long after most of 
us are forgotten. He tells us, with all the directness and frankness of 
a soldier, that the atmosphere which his high duty compels him to 
breathe is tilled with violence. 

Sir, I have in my possession a compilation of hundreds of instances 
of violence, gathered from the public press, giving place and date 
and name ; but I will not refer to them, because their use would be 
met with the assertion that' they were mere newspaper stories ; but 
which while uncontradicted cannot fail to add to the conviction that 
a system of violence does prevail. 

Ami last of all, under the duty Imposed by the Constitution upon 
rlie 1'nsident to communicate to Congress from time to time informa- 
tion of (he state of the Union, we have the deliberate statement of 
I he Chief Magistrate that this allegation of outrage and wron^ is 
tine. Now, sir. it will not do to atteinptto "whistle down the wind' 
a charge sustained by such proof. 

This charge thai a system of violence has existed and does exist 
should have been met by every Senator, without distinction of party, 
with an impartial and firm determination to know the truth, rather 
than by a cold and vaeant denial. It should have been met by a 
united effort to exhaust the whole power of the nation to bring to 
speedy punishment these violators of la w, rat her t ban by justification, 
extenuation, and derision. One Senator tells us that the allegation 
is an insult to the people of his section j and I suppose that is to stop 
action when law is trampled under foot. He tells us that "only in 
rare and isolated instances" does violence occur. 

Another Senator says : 

I do not vindicate murder ; I do not vindicate violation of l,iw ; but 1 hope that 
I!.' people "t all countries, including Louisiana, will never tamely submit like 

cravens ami cowards in in- oppressed « iiliimt a >li<>\\ of resistance. 

I f. sir. t here is any more craven and cowardly way of resist ing even 
oppression than by assassination and murder, I have yet to learn it. 

Another Senator attempts fco hold the charge up to derision, and 
tells us "the outrage business. is played out; that the people have 

In aid that suiij,' nut il it tails to he music to their ears; that the repub- 
lican patty have an outrage-mill; and that t hese stories are part of 
their polil Leal machinery." 

When such astounding statements of systematic violation of law 
as are presented here are thus met by Senators, no one should won- 
der at the saturnalia of crime. If the Senate and House with one 
voice and one heart should denounce these atrocities, and, casting 
party to the winds, let the world know ihai we were determined law 



should reign supreme, there would be order at the South iu sixty 
days. 

If this charge of violation of law he true and such things he toler- 
ated, we see before us the ruin of this Republic. This system of 
organized crime may accomplish the partisan purpose to which it is 
directed ; but it is yet true, as has been well said, that laws that are 
enrolled in the chancery of heaven cannot be repealed by any popu- 
lar vote, and He who enacted them cannot be reached by any bribe 
or moved by any terror. In the violation of that simple law of right 
and wrong which is written in letters of light on the shrine of crea- 
tion, and on all our hearts, you may read the downfall of the gener- 
ations of nations that have figured upon earth. The crimes of the 
Roman republic were lost in the greater crimes of the empire, and 
both were ruined. The revolutions of France, the vibrations between 
anarchy and tyranny in the Greek republics, only prove that no mat- 
ter what be the form, governnent cannot be maintained but by main- 
taining virtue. 

Our fathers, when they laid the foundations of this nation, made a 
compromise with vice, and it well-nigh cost the life of the Republic. 
Too patriotic to inscribe upon the pages of their Constitution that 
word which is the sum of all iniquities ; too logical, when establish- 
ing a government based on the equality of man, to recognize* differ- 
ent grades of citizenship or civil privileges, they yet did tolerate 
slavery ; and the result has been that for every tear-drop that in 
response to the lash of the task-master has trickled down the cheek 
of man, there has been demanded a drop of the heart's blood of the 
sons of those w r ho thus struck hands with a great national wrong. 

We should learn wisdom by experience. We have come to a 
national epoch. The rebellion is over; there has been enough of 
suffering and of torture ; the storm is passed, but the current still 
runs strong. There are animosities, antagonisms, hostility ; and the 
question for us is whether, come weal or woe, we will stand by the 
right, or whether we will suffer the Republic to drift away to that 
destruction which has met every nation that did not withstand the 
tide of vice. 

The people of our country have inscribed on their Constitution 
three principles: universal freedom, universal suffrage, universal cil i- 
zenship. There they are. They are the trophies of the war. To 
purchase them three hundred thousand young men, as good as any of 
us. lie to-day cold and stark in death. Time has brought its allevia- 
tions, but to-day thousands of hearts are shrouded in sorrow. We 
Senators at yonder rostrum have assumed the solemn obligation to do 
all we can to maintain and enforce in letter and in spirit those three 
great amendments of the Constitution. Has it been done ? Is it 
being done? Is there a citizen of the North who would to-day be 
willing to live under such citizenship as the colored people of the 
South are subjected to ? These are questions each Senator of right 
determines for himself. But if these amendments did not exist, how 
plain is the path of policy and of duty At the Revolution the popu- 
lation of the country was three million ; it is now forty million. The 
number of the colored people to-day is four millions eight hundred 
thousand. I do not say that in a like period to that which has elapsed 
since the Revolution the colored population will amount to forty 
million; but I do say that they will amount to twenty million; and 
the question is, as a matter of mere public policy, aside from all con- 
stitutional amendments, whether they should be reasonably elevated, 
educated, and made a thrifty and industrious population, a blessing 



G 

to themselves and to society, or whether they shall be an ignorant 
and degraded race, rising occasionally in revolt as the lingering 
sparks of manhood are fired by some new wrong — whether they 
shall rise to the dignity of creatures of God or become a mass of 
moral degradation pestilential to society. 

Let us remember that the object of government is not to minister 
to the pride or to feed the luxury of men, but its true end is to 
elevate, refine and humanize all who are brought under its influ- 
ence. If we did not intend to give these people the rights of citizens, 
we should have left them slaves. If we did not iutend to give them 
the protection of the law, we should have left them that protection 
which the lord gives his vassals. Look at their history. They were 
brought here by the cupidity of our fathers. They have been docile 
and obedient to law; they have not been pensioners upon our bounty. 
They have cleared our forests, reclaimed our morasses, and every year 
they bring $150,000,000 worth of cotton— the equivalent of gold to the 
wealth of the nation. Without return they have supported in atflu- 
ence a large portion of the people of this country. They have edu- 
cated their children. They have helped to fight our battles. They 
are not indebted to us. And. sir, besides, it is the height of folly for 
a people to quarrel with its labor, for that is its wealth. 

But all these plain and clear obligations of the Constitution, of duty, 
and of policy aremet by one plea, which Ihave heard iterated and reit 
crated when each of the three amendments and when any law for its 
enforcement has been before the Senate, until the plea has become 
vapid and nauseating. That plea is, " We do not want social equality.' 7 
That plea is a fraud or a delusion. There is not, there never has been, 
and never can he any such thing as social equality. The richest and 
most influential man in society cannot take a cup of tea with the 
poorest and humblest old lady in the country without her eonseut. 
Social relations depend upon reciprocal consent ; they depend upon 
taste; they depend upon the affinities of the mind; they depend 
upon the arbitrary will of individuals, which no statute can control. 
Look at it, sir. The most uncouth, illiterate, degraded, and uninvit- 
ing white men in tlie land, if not felons, have now and ever have had 
full and equal civil and political rights. Has this fact compelled any- 
body to associate with that class.' Has it created social equality? 
No : on the contrary, in this country where we do not recognize any 
gradesof citizenship, society has risen to arefinement,a culture, and 
an elevation that it has not attained in those lands where grades of 
citizenship arc recognized. That plea is either a fraud or a delusion. 

The people of tlie Son tli had better not be deceived ; for the people 
of tli is country intend that sooner or later there shall be equal citizen- 
ship here. They intend that tlie plea, "I am an American citizen," 
shall be respected in every nook and corner of the country just as 
much as it is upon the deck of a man-of-war. Do not be carried away 
by any ephemera] excitement; the rights of citizenship have cost 
too much ever to be surrendered. If this system of violence goes on at 
the South, you will see no political divisions at the North. Democrats 
are just as good men as republicans, and when they come to under- 
stand the situation will he as determined as republicans to have the 
law triumphant in this country. There are associations and traditions 
connected with the history of the three great amendments which 
appeal to tlie hearts of all our people. Thej will remember thai the 

sa blanket covered a lamented son and the colored soldier on the 

morass; that they shared I heir w. mini;- canteens together; that they 

hole for each ot her t he last message of affection and even bivouacked 



iii death together ; and our people will say : " We have submitted 
that those who have a chartered right to equal citizenship shall not 
have the full advantage of that public education they are taxed to 
support ; we have submitted that when they travel they shall be 
thrust into the bunk or cattle car; we have submitted that they shall 
eat their rations at the curb-stone instead of the common inn; we 
have submitted that they shall be buried upon the roadside and 
not be permitted burial in that public grave-yard which they are 
taxed to maintain ; but we will not submit that their lives be tortured 
by apprehension and terminated by violence." That will be the sen- 
timent of the democrats and republicans at the North. 

Be not deceived. In 1860 there were democratic leaders who sym- 
pathized with the then approaching rebellion. They told the South 
that there would be a divided North, that military forces would not 
be permitted to pass through certain States, and that there should lie 
no coercion ; but as soon as the old Hag was fired upon, the rank and 
file of the democrats cast to the wind the pledges of their leaders, 
and manfully fought, and died too, for their country. If the people 
of the South gets the impression from anything said here that there 
will be at the North any sympathy with or toleration of the system 
of violence that seems to prevail at the South, they will be deceived. 

A distinguished Senator said the other day that we should concili- 
ate the South. Let me say to the Senators from Southern States 
that I remember that we have a common ancestry and measurably a 
common history, and I hope a common destiny. That I remember t hat 
they made a great mistake and have been disappointed; and while I 
am glad thatthey were, my American manhood forbids that I should 
ever exult over their disappointment. But, sir, let me say that I am 
opposed to any system of so-called "conciliation" because that is not 
to their advantage or the interest of the country. What we all want, 
and must have, is a government of law and equal citizenship e\ ery- 
where. Conciliation! No, Mr. President; that administration of af- 
fairs which depends upon the will of the goverened, and not on the 
will of the governing power, is not government. We want no jelly- 
fish system, that rests on conciliation ; we want a government of bone 
and vertebra', which does not "bear the sword in vain," which is a 
" terror to evil-doers." Let it be the sam in every section. 

It has been eloquently and truly said that the hand which breaks 
down our laws is the hand of death unbarring the gates of pandemo- 
nium and letting loose upon the land the crimes and miseries of 
hell ; and if the Most High should stand aloof and not cast a single 
ingredient into our cup of trembling, it would yet be one of insuffer- 
able woe ; but He will not stand aloof. 

Mr. President, the subject of the prevalence of crime and lawless- 
ness at the South, and especially in Louisiana, and the supreme neces- 
sity of averting anarchy, constitutes the atmosphere through which 
alone you can correctly see and judge of those transactions cf the 4th of 
January, which have excited the country. Sending Federal soldiers 
at all to a State which was peaceful, which was in a normal condition, 
would find no defenders on this side of the Chamber. Having the 
soldiery reinstate one government for another, as was done on the 
14th of September, and which has met approval by the country, has 
only been approved because of the abnormal condition of society at 
New Orleans ; and those utterances, here and elsewhere, which char- 
acterize the conduct of the General Government as if the theater of 
action had been in a peaceful State, where the law was supreme, 
where every citizen was a conservator of the peace, are a simple per- 



8 

version of the true situation and calculated to weaken a government 
which every citizen of every party is bound to strengthen. 

This much I wished to say : that those who wish to look at the trans- 
actions of the 4th of January as they really were may take a proper 
stand-point to view them. 

I think the reflecting people of this country must be painfully im- 
pressed with the injustice that has been done to the President and 
to General Sheridan iu this debate. The President, it is clear, has 
only been influenced by the most humane and patriotic motives. He 
called upon Congress for direction, and Congress in effect told him 
to recognize and to sustain the Kellogg government. He told us that 
he had recognized that government, and that he would continue to 
do so unless we directed to the contrary ; and we were silent. He 
has, as a faithful man, done the best he could ; and it seems to me that 
it is ungenerous and unjust to seek to excite toward him public pre- 
judice or odium. Time and again, when massacre seemed to be im- 
pending, he has averted it. 

As the 4th of January approached the whole country was filled with 
anxiety. The telegraph constantly informed us of the condition of 
affairs there ; and when the day was passed without violence the 
nation was relieved. It was that modest, retiring, and indomitably 
brave man who has so often and so signally averted impending peril 
to his country who was the instrument to turn aside that threat- 
ened sorrow and disgrace. And to classify him with Napoleons, and 
Caesars, and Cromwells, and oriental despots ; to say to the country 
that lie may yet till the corridors of the Senate with troops to con- 
trol legislation ; to suggest that it may be necessary to refuse appro- 
priations to the Army or disband it because he, of all men in this 
world, is unfit to be its commander, is ungenerous and unjust. 

Mr. President, before considering the proceeding of the 4th of Jan- 
uary, let me say a word as to the powers of this nation known as the 
United States of America. The democratic party up to 1860 had so 
cultivated and distorted beyond proportion the doctrine of State 
rights that their theories culminated in James Buchanan's sending, on 
the 4th of December of that year, a message to Congress, stating that 
after serious reflection he had arrived at the conclusion that Con- 
gress had no power to coerce a State which attempted to withdraw 
from the Union. The erroneous theories culminated in that message, 
but the baneful effects of that doctrine can only be arrived at by es- 
timating the blood and treasure the doctrine of State rights has cost 
the country. From the State-rights stand-point it is difficult to dis- 
cover what the military can lawfully do. No, Mr. President, this is 
a nation, and not a general agency of thirty-seven independent sov- 
ereign States. By the Constitution the States are denuded of many 
of the incidents of sovereign power. They can of themselves make 
no agreement or treaty with other States. They can have no foreign 
relations. They can have no army or navy, and even the militia, 
when in service, is under the control of the Federal Government. 
The States, by the surrender of these powers, would be unable to 
maintain their organization against insurrection from within and 
invasion from without. The great common powerto which the States 
look for protection from domestic violence and foreign invasion is 
the 1 'niled States. 

All the power which the United States possesses in this regard is 
set forth in the fourth section of the fourth article of the Constitu- 
tion. Tlie provision is brief, but contains vast powers. The United 
States Government guarantees three things to the several States, in 



9 

consideration of their having surrendered the incidents of sover- 
eignty. It guarantees to them government, security, order, it 
guarantees to the States governmeut. This the United States is to 
see that each State has, whether the Legislature or the governor of 
the State ask the interference or not. 

Every State is interested that there should ho government in each. 
The relations of the States are so intimate that anarchy in one would 
be to the injury of all; and besides, as the citizens of the several 
States are citizens of the United States, they have a right that anarchy 
shall not exist in any. Then, too, the United States has a system of 
laws and government extending into each State, and its laws and 
government can not be enforced in the State that is in a condition of 
anarchy, and the obligation is on the United States to see to it that 
anarchy does not exist anywhere; and this whether the governor or 
the Legislature make a call or not. 

The United States, whether the Legislature or governor ask it or not, 
whether they like it or not, is also to protect the several States from 
invasion. All are interested that the State should not be devastated 
by a foreign foe. All the citizens of the United States are interested 
in this, because as citizens of the United States they have rights, 
property, and privileges in the State to be protected. And the United 
States of its own motion is to afford this security. 

The United States is to do one thing more, but this only on the ap- 
plication of the Legislature or governor. The State having surren- 
dered its rights to an army or navy, the United States is to render its 
aid in protecting from domestic violence. 

Now who is the Uuited States? Is it the executive, or is it tho 
ludicia'ry, oris it Congress ? It is all combined, and it is each of these 
three branches acting separately within its constitutional province. 
The Government which the United States guarantees is to be repub- 
lican in form. Should a State pass a law tending to create an aristoc- 
racy, as that the judgeship should be hereditary, it would be the duty 
of the iudiciary to declare that law void; and in that case, fulfilling 
this guarantee, the judiciary is "the United States." If all govern- 
ment in a State should be broken down, as after the rebellion so that 
it became necessary to organize new governments, then the legisla- 
tive power acts, and Congress is " the United States." If there is do- 
mestic violence in a State and the President is called upon by the 
Legislature or the governor to suppress it, he fulfills the guarantee, and 
hefacting in his province, is " the United States." 

Mr. President, a republican government is not only one m wliic i 
the representatives elected by the people govern, but is one in which 
the succession or continuance of organized authority shall be in ac- 
cordance with the law of the land. That is quite as essential to a 
republican government as that the governing representatives shall 
be elected by the people. If by fraud or force, or both combined, 
this succession or continuance of organized authority according to 
law is interfered with, and the sovereign power is seized by intruders, 
that is a subversion of government and so is a subversion of a repub- 
lican form of government, and the United States by that branch of 
the Government to which the duty appropriately belongs may mter- 

The highest and most atrocious breach of the peace, the most dis- 
astrous domestic violence, is that which prevents the lawful succes- 
sion or continuance of organized authority. 

It is worse than murder, rapine, or arson, because it strikes at the 
heart of o-overnment. If the usurper of power at the imminent mo- 



10 

merit the transfer or succession of government is being made can, by 
stratagem, by a coup d'etat, wrest it from those designated bylaw 
what tolly is it to have armies to protect lawful government! For 
why should usurpers ever peril their lives to get that power which 
they can get by seizing, stealing, thieving ? Why clothe sovereign 
power with a coat of mail, if you leave a joint in the harness open 
where the spear of the usurper may reach the very heart of govern- 
ment? 

Let the United States Senate be careful that in its commendable 
hostility to the interference of the military with the civil authority 
it does not give countenance to the much more dangerous enemies to 
civil authority. The usurper of civil authority, whether by force or 
fraud, is entitled to no sympathy whether their treason be arrested 
by civil or by military agency ; and the State that is delivered from 
the usurpation has suffered no wrong. 

Unless we are careful, this nation with its thirty-seven State Legis- 
latures may by our defense of those who through stratagem attempt 
to seize the government of Louisiana do greater injury to civil lib- 
erty than could ever in this land be dune, by the military power. 

Mr. President, the military power of this country in the hands of 
the people is but that of a mouse under the paw of a lion. In coun- 
tries where the people have little power, and where they are not the 
rulers, and where there are large standing armies, there may be 
danger from military power; and is it not true that the perils and 
dangers to civil liberty which there exist have been adroitly and 
skillfully transferred by some debaters to this country. It seems to 
me that I can hear the brave man of the West laugh at the idea of 
twenty-five thousand solders a few months from the people imperil- 
ing the liberties of their country! There is much of affectation in this 
pretense of danger to liberty from our Army. I think the trumpet 
has given in this case an uncertain sound. 

Now, Mr. President, I have a few words to say in reference to the 
4th of January. Remember the state of partisan feeling at New ( >r- 
le.ins. as manifested by the murders and assassinations that had oc- 
curred. Remember that within ninety days an armed hand of insur- 
gents had overturned the government of the State of Louisiana; that 
they tad shol down bhe police and trampled under foot the civil au- 
thorities; that they had murdered in the streets fifty citizens: that the 
governor himself only saved his life by fleeing to the custom-house. 
Remember thai this insurrection was held in abeyance, bul had not 
been exterminated; that it was like asubterranean tire thai had been 
stamped out at, one point, but was ready to burst out at another at 
any minute. 

As that day approached, these insurgents had a definite purpose 
ami definite plan for accomplishing their purpose. 

Their purpose was at the imminent moment, when the sovereign 
power was being transmitted from one set of representatives to an- 
other, to seize the reins of governmenl by stratagem and by force, 
and thus overturn a government which hail been recognized by the 
courts of the Slate and by I he Federal courts, by the Congress of the 
Dnited States, by the President, which had existed for two years, and 
which this same party had within ninety days successfully seized, but 
were not suffered by t he federal (government act Lng through the mili- 
tary power to hold. Thai this was their purpose is manifest ; first, 
by what occurred on the 4th of Jan nary, of which hereafter ; second, 
by what McMillan, who was elected to the United States Senate by 
the McEnery legislature, told Mr. Foster, one of the committee which 



11 

went to New Orleans. "While sitting in the legislative hall, McMillen 
told him that their plan was that the newly-elected senators were to 
join themselves with those who claimed to be elected to the senate in 
1872, and thus they would have the senate. They were then to obtain 
the house of representatives in the manner we shall see; and that 
then the two houses would recognize McEnery as governor. Thus a 
revolution formerly attempted by force and defeated with the appro- 
bation of the whole country was to be effected by stratagem. 

I am much mistaken if the Senator from Maryland [Mr. Hamil- 
ton] tin' other day did not say in the Senate that if that Legislature 
had not been driven out, Kellogg would not have been governor for 
an hour. The purpose was by a coup d'etat to effect that which they 
had failed to effect by arms and by bloodshed, and some of the people 
are thrown into a convulsion of excitement when this purpose fails. 
If the revolutionary stratagem had succeeded and been tolerated, it 
would have been a lamentable precedent for anarchy in a country 
where there are thirty-seven such legislative bodies, where power is- 
annually succeeding from one set of representatives to another. 

Now, how were the insurgents to get possession of the Legislature ? 
The senate was to be easily managed. The democratic senators did 
not join their associates, but staid out of the senate to join the demo- 
cratic members elected in 1872, when the house should have been se- 
cured. 

How was the coutrol of the house to be obtained 1 The plan of 
the insurgents and the outrageous violation of law are sufficiently man- 
ifested by a statement of the law and by what they did. There were 
two ways, and only two, by which any person could become a member 
of the Legislature — by his being named on the roll prepared by the 
clerk of the former house or by his being declared to be a member 
of the Legislature after it had been organized. Those are the only 
two possible ways in which any one can be a member of the Legis- 
lature of Louisiana. The statute that regulates this subject is the 
twenty-fourth section of the act of November 20, 1872, which declares 
in these words — 

That it shall be the duty of the secretary of state to transmit to the clerk of the 
house of representatives ami the secretary of tin- senate of the last General As 
sembly a list of the names of such persons as. according to the returns, shall have 
been elected to either branch of the Genera] Assembly; and it shall be the duty of 

said clerk and secretary to place the names of the representatives and senators 
ilcct. so furnished, upon the roll of the house and of t he senate respectively ; and 
those representatives ami senators whose names are so placed by the clerk and 
secretary respectively, in accordance with the foregoing provision, and none other, 
shall be competent to organize the house of represental ives or senate. 

Nothing in this act shall bo construed to conflict with article 34 of the constitu- 
tion. 

Let us see if there is anything in the act interfering with the thirty- 
fourth article of the constitution. The thirty-fourth article of the 
constitution provides that — 

Each -house of the General Assembly shall judge of the qualification, election, 
and returns of its members; but a contested election shall be determined in such 
manner as may be prescribed by law. 

The act of 1872, you see, does not conflict with the constitution, but 
affirms it. The constitution says that none but the house shall de- 
termine the qualifications and elections of members. There was no 
house when this action was taken; there had been no organization. 
But the constitution further provides that the manner in which a 
contest shall be conducted shall be prescribed bylaw: and the law 
of 1872 does provide the manner, and expressly says that none, no 
matter whether in fact elected or not, unless their names appear upon 



12 

the roll which is made out by the returning board and sent to the 
secretary of state and given by him to the clerk, shall take part in 
the organization of tbe house. 

There were one hundred and two members on the roll who answered 
to their names; fifty-two, a majority of them, were republicans; fifty 
were democrats. By no possibility could that house under a party 
vote have had other than a republican organization. That was one 
of the difficulties the conspirators had to contend with. 

There was another difficulty. The law provided that the clerk of 
the previous house should hold over, in the language of the act, " to 
facilitate the organization of the new house," and should hold over, 
as the act says, " until a clerk shall have been elected and qualified 
to succeed him. " The former clerk, then, was the representative head 
of that assemblage of persons returned to the Legislature. It was he 
who should call the roll ; it was he who was to preside until the house 
was organized by the election of a speaker. The language of the act 
is this : 

That, for the purpose of facilitating the organization of their respective bodies, 
the secretary of the senate and the chief clerk of the house of representatives shall 
hold over and continue in office from one term of the General Assembly to another 
until their successors are duly elected and qualified. 

These laws were set at defiance. 

Mr. MORTON. Will the Senator allow me to ask him a question ? 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Certainly. 

Mr. MORTON. I desire the Senator to state whether under that 
law there was any authority for the election of what is called a tem- 
porary chairman or speaker to organize the house ? 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Certainly there was not; because there 
was an express provision of law that the clerk of the former house 
should hold over until his successor was appointed, for the purpose, 
in the language of the act, of " facilitating the organization of the 
house." 

Mr. MORTON. I will ask the Senator still further if he under- 
stands the operation of that law and the practice of legislative bodies 
to be that the clerk himself is to act as the presiding officer until the 
organization is complete. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I certainly understand that the clerk is 
to preside until a speaker was elected. 

Mr. President, these laws were set at defiance. The clerk was in 
his chair performing the duty of organization when a member usurped 
his duty. Mr. Billieu nominated Mr. Wiltz as temporary chairman. 
Billieu put the motion, which he had no more right to do than I had. 
Be declared fche mot ion carried and Wiltz elected. You, sir, might with 
equal authority have pronounced that judgment. There never was 
a grosser usurpation. Wiltz was not elected chairman of that house 
for these three reasons: First, because Billieu had no right to put the 
motion, or decide the vote ; second, because he refused to call the 
yeas and nays. Mr. Foster told me that the demand fur the yeas 
and nays was made. The constitution, by the thirty-sixth article, 
provides that "each house of fche General Assembly shall keep and 
publish weekly a journal of it's proceedings, and the yeas and nays 
of the members on any question, at the desire of two of them, shall 
be entered on the journal." A clerk was fco hold over to keep the 
journal. There is the constitutional provision. There was a demand 
for the yeas and nays and there was a refusal. Wiltz was not elected 

the chairman id' that house for the further reason that there were 
fifty-two men there opposed to him, as we have the right to infer, 
and not more than fifty in favor of him. 



13 

Mr. BOGY. I will ask the Senator if Mr. Billieu "was a member of 
the Legislature, that is, one of the persons whose names Avere on the 
list furnished by the former clerk ? 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I understand he was one of those. 

Mr. BOGY. If he was a member, it was according to the usage. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. If he was elected a member of the Legis- 
lature, he was not elected speaker, and he undertook to perform the 
province of speaker by putting a motion and declaring that motion 
carried, and that too when another, provided by law, was presiding 
and when the motion was not carried. 

Mr. BOGY. Did the law to which the Senator alludes authorize 
the clerk to put motions to the vote of that body? The law, if I 
understand it, only made it the duty of the clerk to call the roll of 
the members. It is the usage in the Western States — I know it is in 
my State— for a member whose name has been called to nominate a 
person, and he puts the question to the members whose names have 
been recognized as members, and it is not put by the clerk. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. If the Senator from Missouri had done 
me the honor to listen to what I said, he would have understood my 
view. 

Mr. BOGY. I will state to the Senator that I have listened to his 
speech with great attention and great pleasure, because I think he is 
making a very able speech indeed. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I am much obliged to the Senator. 

The law expressly provided that the clerk should be continued over 
for the very purpose of facilitating the organization ; that he should 
remain clerk until his successor was elected; that is, remain clerk 
until a speaker had been elected and they proceed to the election of 
a clerk. It would be a strange arrangement for the organization of 
legislative bodies if it was the province of one hundred and two men 
whose names were on the roll each to put a motion, each one to say 
"It is carried," and possibly have one hundred and two different re- 
sults. That would be an organization into chaos! 

Mr. MORTON. Will the Senator allow me to call his attention to 
the fact that at the time that man made the motion to elect Wiltz as 
temporary chairman none of them had been sworn in by the clerk ? 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Not one. None of them were sworn in 
before the republicans left in any other manner than according to Dr. 
Franklin's plan of ashing a blessing upon the whole barrel of pork. 
They were not sworn in, as I understand, otherwise than by Wiltz 
declaring them to be sworn. 

But, Mr. President, let lis proceed. What use is there in raising a 
question whether Billieu had a right to put a motion or not, when 
the constitution provided that they should call the yeas and nays 
when they were demanded, and when they were refused and refused 
just because there was a majority against the motion ? 

Immediately on Wiltz's taking the chair, Mr.Trezevan was declared 
elected clerk. There was yet no permanent organization of the 
house. Then Mr. Billieu again moved that five persons who claimed 
to be elected, but whose names had not been placed upon the roll, 
should be sworn in as members; and this by the usurping speaker 
was declared carried. Another demand for the yeas and nays was 
made, and it was refused. They were not members of that house 
because they were not on the roll, and there was no house organized 
which could admit them. What a farce to say that live members who 
claimed contested seats could be admitted when there was no house 
organized, no committee appointed, nobody to look at the testimony, 



I 



14 

to look at the credentials, and when the law of the State expressly 
said that they should not be admitted until after there was an organi- 
zation. What a farce to pretend that these men were members of 
that house when the person who put the motion expressly refused to 
call the yeas and nays, and when we have a right to infer that there 
were fifty-two against their admission and only fifty in favor of it. 

Then, sir, we have this case : Here are five persons assuming with- 
out authority to exercise the sovereign power of the State of Louisi- 
ana ; fifty democrats join with them, making fifty-five, which changes 
the political complexion of the house, there thus being fifty-five 
democrats and fifty-two republicans, and thus by this legerdemain 
those men who had been defeated in their revolutionary project, 
with the approval of the country, by the Army of the United States, 
on the 14th of September, have subverted that government and 
placed themselves in the seat of power. The case is like this: Say 
there were seventy-one Senators of the United States and three 
vacancies; of the seventy-one, thirty-six were democrats and thirty- 
five were republican, and suppose that the republican members 
should come into this Chamber with throe men and should apply to 
the Vice-President to put a motion that those three men be admitted 
as Senators and sworn, and lie refusing some republican rises in his 
seat, puts the motion, and declares it carried. If some Senator objects 
and demands the yeas and nays, the demand is refused. The motion 
is declared carried and these three men are admitted. Now, the re- 
publicans would have the majority, they having thirty-eight mem- 
bers and the democrats but thirty-six. That is the case before us. 
It is revolution. Suppose, to make the case nearer parallel, that the 
same republican party within ninety days had by open violence 
by an army of ten thousand men in the streets of Washington at- 
tempted to subvert this Government ; that they had made a demo- 
cratic President flee to the house of some friend to protect his life ; 
that they had stricken down fifty men in the streets; would this not 
make the atrocity more apparent, if not more aggravated ? That is 
this case. 

Mr. President, the grave' allegation which lias fired the American 
heart that the Federal soldiery have driven five members of the Leg- 
islature of Louisiana from the legislative hall wants the essential in- 
gredient of fact and truth. They were not members of the Legisla- 
ture. They were only members of a conspiracy to subvert the gov 
eminent. Are they to remain there? If they are, it is a successful 
rebellion against lawful authority. They must be removed ; but how? 
Had they shot five republicans in their seats, then it would have 
been proper, I suppose all will admit, to have removed the five in- 
truders by force. 

But we are told they used no violence. Ah! Mr. President, if I drop 
the arsenic into the cup of my associate I use no particular violence, 
but the result is death. So these men used the violence necessary to 
accomplish the conspiracy intended to be to that government, ay, and 
to many of the people, death. And such would have been the result 
had their purpose not been averted. They committed violence upon 
the rights of the people of Louisiana. It was their right that the 
Continuing clerk should facilitate the organization of the house until 
his successor was elected. It was t heir right t hat a majority and not 
a minority should speak for the body. It was their righl that every 
decision should only be made by a call of the yeas and nays when 
they were demanded. It was their right that none but those on the 
roll should take part in the organi/at ion. They used violence enough. 



15 

But how are they to be removed ? Shall the sergeant-at-arms remove 
them ? He and his associates seem to have been, by previous arrange- 
ment, parties to the lawless proceeding. And, besides, there is no 
sergeant-at-arms to an assemblage not organized. 

As those who sought to subvert the government had invoked the 
military power to sustain themselves, shall Governor Kellogg seek 
the aid of that power ? 

I am opposed to the interference of the military power with civil 
authority in time of peace. But those who were removed were not 
clothed with civil authority ; they were intruders ; they were at- 
tempting themselves unlawfully to wrest civil authority from those 
to whom the law gave it ; and it was not a time of peace. The tires 
of insurrection which time and again had broken forth were only 
slumbering ; and if their conspiracy had been successful, it would no 
doubt again have brought devastation and death. 

I am opposed to any intervention of the military power which 
might even be perverted into a precedent in other times and under 
other circumstances. 

The question is whether Governor Kellogg, following the example 
of his adversaries, was authorized to seek the aid of the military, 
and that is all the question before its or before the people. In an- 
swer to that question I will ask another, and end my remarks on 
this subject. Let me ask who is there here, had he been chief magis- 
trate of Louisiana intrusted with the solemn duty of preserving the 
government of that State, of preserving its peace, of preserving the 
lives of its citizens — who, seeing now that that government has been 
preserved, that peace has been preserved, that the lives of the citi- 
zens have been protected — who is there who would to-day take the 
responsibility of undoing, were it possible, what was done at that 
critical moment ? I would not take that responsibility. 



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